Page:Frank Spearman--Whispering Smith.djvu/369

 ask me this question? How can I know which it shall be? What is it you mean?”

“I mean I will not take his life in a fight—if it comes to that—if you would rather he should come back.”

A sob almost refused an answer to him. “How can you ask me so terrible a question?”

“It is a question that means a good deal to me, of course, and I don’t know just what it means to you: that is the point I am up against. I may have no choice in the matter, but I must decide what to try to do if I have one. Am I to remember first that he is your husband?”

There was a silence. “What shall I say—what can I say? God help me, how am I to answer a question like that?”

“How am I to answer it?”

Her voice was low and pitiful when her answer came: “You must do your duty.”

“What is my duty then? To serve the paper that has been given to me, I know—but not necessarily to defend my life at the price of his. The play of a chance lies in deciding that; I can keep the chance or give it away; that is for you to say. Or take the question of duty again. You are alone and your friends are few. Haven’t I any duty toward you, perhaps? I don’t know a woman’s heart. I used to think I did, but I don’t. 343